The Lie and the Lady (26 page)

She tried to not think about the mention of his bed, and instead took a deep breath. She was here for a reason after all.

“Actually it's not such a strange occurrence, I'm told. My husband Konrad was a man . . . who preferred the company of other men.”

If Turner was surprised or disgusted or confused, she could not see it on his face. Instead he asked, “Are you quite sure?”

“Quite.” She allowed a little bubble of laughter to escape her lips. “A wife knows. There were certain marital activities that Konrad was reluctant to engage in.”

Both of Turner's eyebrows rose. He coughed to clear his throat. “That may well be. But how would Mr. Blackwell—who is not a wife—know of it?”

“That's a longer story,” she said, sighing. “You have to understand that Konrad . . . When we married, I was a bit more naïve than I am now.”

“I cannot imagine you naïve.”

“Strange but true,” she said, the ghost of a smile on her lips. “I was just a rich miller's daughter, with a sister who had married well enough for the country, but for me to try for a ton connection? It was presumptuous at best. I was friendless, I had very few invitations. Then, at one ball, Konrad asked me to dance. And he was dazzling. He lit the room around us brighter than a thousand candles. I was so swept up in anyone paying attention to me that I didn't pay attention to anything else.”

“But soon enough . . .” he prompted.

“Yes, soon enough,” she agreed, “I made my discovery. And when I confronted Konrad about it, he didn't deny it. In fact, he was somewhat surprised that I was surprised. It was not something about himself he hid very well. Which was actually more the reason he was in London than any war. He'd caused a bit of a scandal in Vienna and his family sent him away until people's memories became shorter. He thought marriage would hurry that along for himself.”

She shifted the cream-soaked cloth to the other side of her neck, where the ghost of an old itch began whispering for attention.

“After I found out we went to the country for a bit, and when we returned to town, I was no longer naïve.”

Turner shifted in his seat again. But he no longer idly toyed with his teacup or let his eyes fall to the floor. Indeed, his eyes were boring into hers. But he was patient.

Always infinitely patient, her Mr. Turner.

“While our marriage was a bit of a scandal—an Austrian count to a miller's daughter—Konrad was his own scandal. He tried to keep his secret, but . . .” She shrugged. “Because of his title, it was overlooked by the less picky members of society. When there is a ballroom of four hundred people, chances are one or two of them are going to be less than paragons.”

“I remember enough about London to know that,” Turner said, rubbing his chin in thought. “I'm quite surprised we did not cross paths, or rather, that you did not cross Ashby's path.”

“Who would have introduced us? We did not have many close friends. So we became very good friends to each other.”

“Friends?”

“Yes,” she said, smiling at the memory. “Konrad—in private, when he was allowed to be himself—was a wonderful person. But he could never be truly happy, and that, I believe, led him down some darker paths.” She took a deep breath. “Have you heard of an establishment called the Yew Tree Club?”

“Not specifically,” Turner replied carefully. “But I can guess.”

“Aside from the usual vices, it caters to a wide variety of predilections. Including Konrad's. More than once I had to fetch him from the Yew Tree. I could not trust a driver or a servant to not tell tales out of school. Appearances had to be kept as much as possible, after all.”

She remembered those early mornings. Yes, she did—the predawn bleariness. The knock on her door of an urchin with a note. And then Konrad, crying and unwilling to leave the debauched room of the Yew Tree in which he had barricaded himself, until his wife came and scratched on the door. He was so deeply miserable, giving in to what he wanted and knowing it wasn't permitted, that it had made everyone he'd ever loved cast him aside.

Then they would go to the country for a while, just in case there had been someone at the Yew Tree who reveled in tales of another person's misery.

“Mr. Blackwell is familiar with the Yew Tree, I take it,” Turner said finally.

“Yes.” She nodded. “Although his predilection—if he has one—is not something I care to know.”

“He shouldn't have done that to you,” Turner said, shaking his head.

“Mr. Blackwell?”

“No, Konrad.” The name came out like fire. “Making you go to the Yew Tree. You were his wife.”

“Yes. And as his wife I was one of the few people he trusted completely,” she said.

“You were a better wife to him than he was a husband to you. You still are.”

“I hate to shatter your illusions, but that is the case in most marriages,” she replied. “Besides, Konrad was not a patron of the Yew Tree Club very long. Eventually he met Lord Vere.”

“Lord Vere? From Northumberland?” Turner's head came up. “He and Ashby were both members of White's, if I recall. Are you telling me . . .”

“Yes—he and Konrad fell in love. But Lord Vere was much better at hiding his truth than Konrad was. And it drove Konrad mad that Vere would keep his distance in public. They couldn't even be seen as friends. And eventually it killed him.”

“Killed him?” Turner asked. “I thought your husband was thrown from his horse.”

“He was, when chasing after Vere in the course of a lover's quarrel.” Riding was one of the few things they could do together in front of the world. Vere had been about to get married. Konrad, although married himself, was eaten up inside with it. Because Vere intended to make his a marriage in truth—he had a legacy to think of, after all. The last she'd heard of him, Vere had just had his third child with his fat wife—visiting her once a year in Northumberland, just long enough to get her pregnant again, and spending the rest of his time comfortably ensconced in a leather chair at White's.

“And he left you behind to pick up the pieces,” Turner concluded. “And one assumes without any money.”

“You knew me as a fortune hunter the moment we met, didn't you?” she asked quietly.

“I knew that you were desperate and cunning, and would do what you had to do to keep your place in society,” he replied, his voice equally low. “And I didn't care a whit.”

He'd loved her anyway. The words echoed in her head, but he hadn't spoken them. They were as much a memory as Konrad.

“Well, when needs must,” she said instead, hiding any emotion under a sniffle. “I can't help but still feel my life would have been so much different if Konrad had been able to be honest from the start.”

“Would you have still married him?”

“Probably. Probably not. But it's a decision I could have made with my eyes open. After he died, his family wanted nothing to do with me. We'd never conceived a child so they had no such obligations. And here I'd been a lowly miller's daughter and then a countess. Of the two, I much preferred the latter.”

“Why?” he asked, unable to keep the curiosity out of his face. “Speaking as someone who owns a mill myself, I find it to be much more satisfying than living a lie.”

“Because it can all go away so quickly,” she replied. “My father was successful, but every penny was pinched, everything was always on the precipice of falling over.

“Then a blight ruined the timberlands that supplied his mill. Everything became so much harder for him after that . . . He tried to economize, but eventually he ended up selling the mill for a fraction of what it was once worth. Luckily Fanny and I were already married by then, but he died bitter and striving. At least when Konrad was alive, I had some security. I knew I would never live in uncertainty.”

“Yes, it is hard,” Turner said after a moment. “But everything worth doing is. The world is growing, and it needs to be supplied. Surely that is worth risking a little uncertainty.”

She said nothing. After all, what could she say? That she was selfish and wanted creature comforts? That she had once been dressed in silks and diamonds and nothing else could possibly compare—not even a cozy kitchen and an intimate conversation in the wee hours of the morning?

Not even the look from a man to whom she could tell all her truths, no matter how hidden or small?

“You've risked more uncertainty than most,” she finally said. “A mill that has burned twice? At this point, most would call it foolhardy to continue.”

“Most would call it madness. Especially those in this town. But that's not the point.”

“What is the point?”

“This is where I am meant to be. I could have stayed in the army, an officer. I could have stayed in London. Ned would have given me something to do. But I spent so long in other places, trying to fold myself into roles that were not mine. This is where I am meant to be, and this is what I am meant to be doing.”

“Grinding grain to make flour.”

“We make some very good flour,” he replied, smiling. And she realized his smile matched her own.

His dark eyes held hers for a long moment, and Leticia felt something strange and foreign spread over her skin.

Peace.

She could fall asleep right there, she thought. She was, for the first time in a very long time, truly relaxed. She could put her head down on the counter and let her bones melt, having unburdened herself to the man in front of her, and trusted that he would keep those secrets safe.

After all, they had other secrets, the two of them.

It was Turner who looked away first.

“So, from what I understand, Mr. Blackwell has the means by which to expose your late husband's . . . predilection to Sir Barty. And this has you frightened.”

“Frightened is a strong word,” she said, blinking her way out of their stolen moment.

“You came to me, you must be frightened. But I did not think you scared this easily.”

“This easily?” Her eyebrow came up.

“Yes, because you said it yourself. This is not something Konrad hid very well. Therefore in some circles it might have been considered general, if unspoken, knowledge.”

“Yes, but Sir Barty and Lincolnshire are not members of those circles.”

“Surely he would not hold Konrad's sins against you.”

She looked at him with pity. “Surely you're not that naïve. Don't you know that a wife is judged by her husband's actions? A man may spill the ink, but a woman wears the stain.”

“No woman could wear this stain,” he replied, crossing his arms over his chest. “It is actually, physically impossible.”

“So?”

“So . . . tell him. Tell Sir Barty. And tell him why you're telling him. Then Blackwell will have nothing to hold over you, and you can go about your life free of him.”

“It's not that simple,” she replied.

“Yes it is.”

“No,” she said. “It is not. Oh, you are right on many levels. I could tell Sir Barty about Konrad. Hopefully he would not bat an eye. Let's say I tell him too why the topic has come up. That Mr. Blackwell made veiled threats with this knowledge. That, I am afraid, he would not believe.”

“Of course he would,” Turner said, but looked as if even he did not trust it.

“There are a few ways this chess match could play out. In the less likely version, Sir Barty believes me absolutely and throws Blackwell out.”

“Why is the best-case scenario also the least likely?” Turner asked.

“Because we are living in the real world, not a fiction,” she replied dryly. “The second most likely event would be that Sir Barty believes me absolutely and confronts Blackwell with it. In that scenario, Mr. Blackwell is smart enough to explain himself, saying I misinterpreted what was said, and that he apologizes profusely. Forget for a moment that it is his fiancée who brings him this accusation. Blackwell is forgiven because he is such a good fellow.”

“And the third . . .”

“The third is that Sir Barty does not believe me at all, because Blackwell is, as stated, such a good fellow. He will not even bother going to Blackwell before patting me on the head and dismissing my account.” She took the cloth off her neck and delicately folded it before placing it on the counter. “But all three of these scenarios have the unfortunate side effect of letting Mr. Blackwell know that I have made a move against him. And he will not look favorably on it.”

Turner's hand dropped from his chin as he considered her words.

“You must be very good at chess,” he said finally.

“I am astonishingly good,” she replied. “Getting rid of Mr. Blackwell will not be easily done. He is currying favor with Sir Barty. And, it seems, with Margaret—and she could very well be responsive to his overtures.”

She thought back to the day of blushes and their conversation after dinner. If Blackwell was a threat, it was here.

Turner's jaw set at that. “He's angling after Miss Babcock?”

“Is it so unthinkable? After all, it's what your mother would have you do to secure your interests with Sir Barty. Heavens, even Sir Barty is all for offering up the milling of grain as dowry to you. I imagine he'd make the same deal with Blackwell. And while Mr. Blackwell is not only bad news for me, he is bad news for you, for obvious reasons. But he is utterly terrible for Margaret. Can you imagine a man like that marrying her? What he would do to her?”

If Margaret became Blackwell's bride, she'd be taken away, rendered even more friendless than she currently was. His dark and twisted soul would break hers, and quite easily. For underneath that tough spiked shell, Margaret was very much protecting something pure and vulnerable.

“We cannot allow that to happen,” she said, folding her hands in her lap now. “And the easiest way to rid ourselves of Blackwell is for you to win Sir Barty's business.”